The British government has been offering financial incentives to strip clubs and other adult entertainment venues that hire teenage workers.

Under the umbrella of a wider scheme to boost employment, the Department for Work and Pensions gives $3,800 to adult establishments that provide full-time jobs – such as bartending or reception roles – to workers aged 18-24, the Sunday Times of London reports.

As long as the employees are neither “performing”, nor undertaking tasks with a “sexual purpose”, the establishments are eligible for payments.

Lesser payments are available to businesses that hire part-time workers.

The Labour MP who discovered the subsidies, Fiona Mactaggart, called for them to be axed. “I do not think parents would welcome this government-sponsored recruitment into the sex industry … These are entry-level jobs into a world of gross exploitation and violence,” she said.

The department responded it had advised job centers to only discuss vacancies in the adult industries, also including lap-dancing bars and massage parlous, with young people who inquired about them. They neither advertise nor subsidize performing roles, a spokesman said.